Celebrity Nooz: Stella Stevens

Stella Stevens (Actress) - The Nutty Professor, The Courtship of Eddie's Father

Updated: 12/4/13

Name: Stella Stevens

Birth Name: Estelle Caro Eggleston

Born: October 1, 1938, Yazoo City, Mississippi

Claim To Fame: Known for her acting career that has lasted over 50 years, and inludes such films as The Nutty Professor and The Courtship of Eddie's Father.

Family Life: She was married to Noble Herman Stephens from 1954-1957. They have one child, Herman Andrew Stephens, who would later be known as actor/producer Andrew Stevens. She has been in a relationship with guitarist Bob Kulick since 1983.

Info: Stevens became interested in acting and modeling while attending Memphis State College. She was discovered and offered a contract with 20th Century Fox when performing in a college production of Bus Stop.

Her first film role was in Say One for Me (1959), for which she won a Golden Globe Award in 1960. Although her relationship with 20th Century-Fox didn't last long, she soon signed a contract with Paramount Pictures after winning the role of Appassionata Von Climax in the musical Li'l Abner (1959).

Stevens also made a name for herself as a model in the late 1950s and 1960s. In January 1960 she was Playboy magazine's Playmate of the Month and was also featured in Playboy pictorials in 1965 and 1968. She was included in Playboy magazine's 100 Sexiest Stars of the 20th Century, appeared at number 27. During the 1960s she was one of the most photographed women in the world.

She had many successful acting credits in the 1960s, including 1962's Girls! Girls! Girls! opposite Elvis Presley, Jerry Lewis's The Nutty Professor (1963), and Vincente Minnelli's The Courtship of Eddie's Father (1963). After signing a contract with Columbia Pictures in 1964, she appeared in Synanon (1965), The Secret of My Success (1965), and opposite Dean Martin in the Matt Helm spy spoof The Silencers (1966).

Stevens began the 1970s with an appearance in Sam Peckinpah's The Ballad of Cable Hogue opposite Jason Robards. During this decade, she shifted the focus of her career from films to television series, miniseries, and movies.

She appeared in episodes in such popular series as Banacek (1973) and Police Story (1975), as well as the pilot films for The Love Boat (1977) and Hart to Hart (1979). Some of her other television credits include Newhart (1983), The Love Boat (1983), Fantasy Island (1983), Highway to Heaven (1984), Murder, She Wrote (1985), Magnum, P.I. (1986), and Father Dowling Mysteries (1987).

Stevens has also appeared in many stage productions, including a touring production of an all-female version of Neil Simon's The Odd Couple opposite Sandy Dennis. She produced and directed the films The Ranch (1989) and The American Heroine (1979).

Trivia: Her father was an insurance salesman, and her mother was a nurse.

Attended St. Anne's Catholic School on Highland Street and Sacred Heart School.

Finished her final year of high school in 1955 at the Memphis Evening School at Memphis Tech High School.

In 1960 she won a Golden Globe Award for New Star of the Year ? Actress.

In 1976, she purchased a ranch in Methow Valley near Carlton, Washington, on the eastern edge of the Cascade Mountains.

In 1999, she co-wrote a novel titled, Razzle Dazzle, about a Memphis-born singer named Johnny Gault.

Where Are They Now: Stella currently lives with her boyfriend Bob Kulick in her Beverly Hills home.

In 2005 Stevens was awarded the Reel Cowboys Silver Spur Award for her notable contribution to the Western genre.

Her television career continued into the 2000s when she appeared in an episode of Twenty Good Years (2006).

Her most recent credit was in the 2010 short Dante's Inferno: Abandon All Hope.

Write To Stella Stevens:
Stella Stevens
Universal Mail Center
12400 Ventura Blvd #502
Studio City, CA 91604

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